The instant disclosure relates to medical devices. In particular, the instant disclosure relates to multi-electrode catheters that are usable for both tissue ablation and electrophysiological mapping.
Catheters are used in a variety of diagnostic and therapeutic procedures, for example to diagnose and/or treat conditions such as atrial and ventricular arrhythmias. For example, a catheter carrying one or more electrodes can be deployed and manipulated through a patient's vasculature and, once located at the intended site, radiofrequency (“RF”) energy can be delivered through the electrodes to ablate tissue. Multi-electrode catheters can also be used to generate cardiac geometries/model surfaces and/or electrophysiology maps.
Various extant multi-electrode catheters can have certain specific advantages and shortcomings. For example, ablation catheters often have improved steerability relative to catheters used for electrophysiology mapping, making them well-suited for accessing hard-to-reach areas. Yet, because they have a relatively small number of widely-spaced electrodes (that is, they are relatively low density), they are not as well-suited to gathering electrophysiology data.
Electrophysiology mapping catheters, on the other hand, typically have a higher density of electrodes (e.g., 10-20 electrodes with various inter-electrode spacing), making them well-suited to gathering electrophysiology data, but less maneuverable and less well-suited to the delivery of therapy (e.g., ablation).
Because of these tradeoffs, extant devices generally are not used to perform multiple functions, potentially requiring multiple devices to be inserted into and removed from a patient's body during a single procedure. For example, during an electrophysiology procedure, a high density multi-electrode catheter may be used to generate an electrophysiology map. Once the map is created, the high density mapping catheter can be removed and an RF ablation catheter inserted in its place.
Yet, many practitioners would find it advantageous, for example, to conduct additional electrophysiology assessments (e.g., isochronal activation maps, geometry creation, lesion/scar quality assessments, and the like), both during and after the ablation (e.g., to judge the efficacy of the ablation), and it would be efficient to do so with the same catheter that was used to deliver the ablation in the first instance. It would also be advantageous to use more highly-maneuverable ablation catheters to map the electrophysiological activity in hard-to-reach areas, but without compromising the speed with which electrophysiology maps can be generated when using high density multi-electrode catheters.